Democrats and the media cried foul Thursday when acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney argued that it was “appropriate” for the president to withhold funds from Ukraine until it investigated possible interference in the 2016 presidential election.

But the Democrat-controlled U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill in September that imposes restrictions on transactions with Russia until it had been cleared of election interference.

The House bill amended an earlier Senate bill — S. 1790, the “National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020” — that required the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to investigate possible Russian interference in elections.

In the House version, all “United States persons” are prohibited “from engaging in transactions with, providing financing for, or in any other way dealing in Russian sovereign debt” after a certain date. That prohibition is lifted after the DNI can certify, within a certain timeframe, that “neither the Government of Russia, nor any person acting as an agent of or on behalf of that government, has knowingly engaged in interference in the most recent election for Federal office”; and after “Congress has passed a joint resolution certifying the determination” of the DNI.